Insurance broker admits $1M investment scheme

A former independent contractor for Daniel & Henry Co. in St. Louis pleaded guilty Friday to mail fraud charges in connection with an investment scheme that cost investors more than $1 million.

From 2003 to 2009, Germaine Pang, 60, of St. Louis, convinced family members, friends and fellow members of her sorority Delta Sigma Theta to invest in the non-existent Krupp Fund, which she promised would return good rates of return on investment, prosecutors said.

Pang deposited investors’ money into her own personal bank accounts and lived off the investors’ money, prosecutors said.

To make her scheme appear legitimate, Pang registered the name of “Krupp dba Germaine M. Pang” with the Missouri Secretary of State and opened a bank account in that name, according to the U.S. attorney’s office.

Pang also created fraudulent annual reports that she mailed to investors to lull them into believing that their investments were safe and were growing, according to prosecutors.

Pang faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and fines up to $250,000 when she is sentenced Sept. 15.